Patrick Seamans

Alum Elected to Community Council

by Pamela J. Johnson

SC alumnus Patrick Seamans has been elected a representative on the Mid-City West Community Council, which represents residents and stakeholders in the Melrose-Fairfax area of Los Angeles.

Seamans, who is deaf, has earned three master’s degrees and a Ph.D., including a joint master’s in international public administration, public policy and development from USC College’s School of International Relations and the School of Planning, Policy and Development.

He earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in architecture from UC Berkeley, where he graduated cum laude. Seamans, 54, has traveled to 46 countries and has dual American and French citizenship.

At USC, he earned his Ph.D. from the Rossier School of Education in international and intercultural education, policy, planning, administration and development. He received his additional master’s in bilingual education.

At USC College, Seamans became certified as a translator in French and German. His Ph.D. adviser, Robert Kaplan, professor emeritus of linguistics, and history Professor Paul Knoll, who served on two of his academic committees, remain good friends.

Steve Lamy, professor of international relations, remembered Seamans as a fearless debater.  “He just jumped in,” Lamy said. “He wasn’t afraid to argue his point if he didn’t think someone was right. He was one of the best students in class.”

Seamans was born premature in 1952, in a military hospital in Germany. He weighed four pounds. At 2 days old, the infant developed a fever.

Doctors gave him streptomycin — an antibiotic that would be banned a year later for causing deafness. “So the same antibiotic that saved my life,” Seamans said, “also left me profoundly deaf.”